Several shodan contempraneous to mine all from the same dojo under the same teacher all have vastly different skill levels. People are different. Why expect a dan ranking to mean everyone conforms to anything except they have got that dan ranking-face value is all it is?

If people don't know they suck at shodan then they have the wrong mindset for progress. One must always strive for better no matter the current state of skills, knowledge and understanding.

"In my opinion, the time of spreading aikido to the world is finished; now we have to focus on quality." Yamada Yoshimitsu